


The Chain

by ShortInsomniac98



Category: Good Omens, Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Anniversary, Blacksmithing, Cute, Fluff, Gift Giving, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Married Couple, Married Crowley/Aziraphale, Married Ineffable Husbands, Medieval England, Nonbinary Crowley, crowley's necklace, inaccurate history, medieval setting, the danelaw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2020-04-06 09:51:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19060252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShortInsomniac98/pseuds/ShortInsomniac98
Summary: Origin story for the chain Crowley wears around his neck. Crowley and Aziraphale are currently living in the Danelaw, and it's the 5,000th anniversary (give or take) of the day they met. With the help of one of his students, a young blacksmith named Rohesia, Aziraphale makes Crowley a necklace.





	The Chain

**Author's Note:**

> This stemmed from a conversation I had with a friend on Tumblr about just where Crowley's necklace, which had become a bit of an obsession for us, came from. We decided it was a gift from Aziraphale, and I think I said something along the lines of, "Maybe he made it. Traded reading lessons for blacksmithing lessons or something."
> 
> So...this story is for Mysti, who got me obsessed with Crowley's necklace and finding out just what was on it, who encouraged me to write this story, and who helped me make some important last-minute decisions. Thank you.

“You're wearing that today,” said Aziraphale, barely looking up from the leaves of parchment which covered the kitchen table as, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Crowley come striding in.

“What's that?” Crowley asked.

He dropped a scarf full of various metallic items on the table, right in the middle of one of the pages Aziraphale was referencing.  Aziraphale sighed and looked him over as he carefully pulled a page out from under his spouse's treasure trove.

Crowley unfolded the scarf and sifted through the contents until he found the pair of silver tortoise broaches, and affixed them to his tunic.  They had been a gift from some Jarl in Norway almost a century back, and though they were antiques and very much out of fashion, there was a sense of sentimentality attached to them that kept him wearing them even now.  Aziraphale looked over the rest of the jumbled mess of jewelry: keys, shears, pouches with coins and others with undeniably more questionable content…all associated with women, some also even associated with sorcery.  Had they been anywhere but the Danelaw, other than perhaps Scandinavia itself, Aziraphale might have been more adamant to prevent Crowley from going out with such things tied to his belt.

“Why, pray tell, are you wearing all that?” Aziraphale asked, gesturing to the array of intricate accessories.

“But I’m wearing trousers, too, see?” Crowley returned, ignoring the question.  He raised one of his legs, resting his foot now on Aziraphale’s papers.  “And a man’s tunic!  It’s a little long, but it’s still a tunic.”

Aziraphale sighed.  “I just thought maybe you’d want to think about what kind of attention you’re after,” he said softly.  He hadn’t meant to start an argument.

“Wait.  Does it bother you?” asked Crowley, frowning as he tied a bundle of keys to one of his belt loops.

“No,” Aziraphale shook his head, “I quite enjoy it.  It suits you.  But I also just think—”

“And when has anyone else cared?”

“Well—”

“That bloke in Constantinople doesn’t count.”

Aziraphale sighed, shaking his head.  “Alright.  You’re probably right, darling.”

“Usually am, angel.”  Crowley smiled.  He finished tying the scarf around his head, covering the top of his hair, and he stood and gave the angel a quick kiss on the forehead.  “See you tonight.”

“Hopefully not too late.”

“Alright!” he called after he was already out the door; Aziraphale doubted he had heard him.

Aziraphale smiled to himself as he gathered the slips of parchment from on the table.  Tucking them into his bag, he made his way over to the door and peeked out to make sure the demon was out of sight before he made his own way out into the town.  Aziraphale never asked where Crowley went during the day, and Crowley never asked what Aziraphale did during the day either.  Still, he didn’t want Crowley to know where it was he was going, today of all days.

Taking care to take the back roads and side alleys, he made his way across the village to a small hut, set apart from all the other houses.  This house, if it could be called a house, was different from many others of its size in that it had a large chimney and no doors.  Just inside the place where the door should have been sat a young woman, a pair of pliers in her hand and a chain in the other, so long it stretched almost all the way to the floor.  She was using the light coming in the doorway to do her work, as the rest of the hut was darkened by smoke so thick it hid the light of the fire which burned constantly within.

“Morning, Rohesia,” he said, clearing his throat to stifle a cough.

“You’re late again, Riffel,” the woman said.  She didn’t even bother to look up.  “If you don’t want to work with me, you don’t have to.  I’m hardly the only blacksmith in town, you know.”

“Yes,” he said with a nervous sort of laugh, “but you’re the only one who…”

“Who doesn’t judge your…situation?” she said carefully, looking up now.

“Of course,” he said.  “And I don’t judge yours.”

“Of course,” she smiled.  “Shall we, then?”

She stood, leaving her stool by the door and leading him out to a table behind the house in what looked to be a garden.  Thick vines covered in purple flowers climbed up the fence which separated Rohesia’s property from her neighbor’s, and below yellow dandelions peppered the grass.  A small flowerbed against the back wall of the hut was overgrown with flowering pepper plants and a tomato plant poured out of a barrel by the back doorway.  At the back corner of the yard stood a large white tent with another barrel at the door full of the same purple flowers growing in it and running down the sides.

“I know, it’s a mess,” she said, noticing the way his eyes darted everywhere at once.  “And I know the dandelions are a weed, but I think they’re rather charming and I don’t have the heart to pluck them when they sprout up.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head.  “It’s lovely.  I was just thinking how much my, er, acquaintance would like this.”

“You can call him what he is,” she said.  “We’re all friends here.”

“What, you me, and the plants?” he chuckled.  “Fine.  My _spouse_.  He would love this place.  It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

She smiled, and nodded toward a table.  “Come on.”

“Now,” she said once they were seated across the table from one another, “I was thinking something like this.  What do you think?”

She laid the chain she had been working on lengthwise across the table.  It was a simple silver one, about twenty inches long, with small, rounded links.  Aziraphale leaned forward to examine it, turning it over with his thumb and index finger.  Across the table, Rohesia looked on expectantly, her chin resting in her hand, which she was trying to use to hide the small, proud smile which was starting to spread across her face.

“It’s beautiful, Ro,” he said.  “I think he’ll love it.”

“I hope so,” she said.  “And…you’re still wanting to make your own links?  Are you sure you don’t want to go with some I’ve already made, and just put them together as a chain?  Smithing is a bit dangerous, especially if you’ve never done it.”

“I want to make as much of it myself as possible,” he said.  “I want it to be as much _from me_ as it can be.”

“Alright,” she nodded.  “Let’s get to work then.  This could take some time.”

The inside of the shop was hot, and it was more than a bit difficult to see through the smoke.  Aziraphale knew this wasn’t what Hell was truly like, but at least now he understood why mortals liked to imagine it was.  It was a horrible environment to be in, let alone to do such hard labor in.  He looked at Rohesia and how easily she pushed through it, hammering out the iron, moving things at just the right time, knowing just when to plunge the bar into the barrel of water between the fire and the anvil and when to look away or shield her face from the steam and smoke so she wouldn’t be blinded, choked, or slowed down in her work.  He marveled, too, at how quickly she worked.  In just minutes, she had a long, thin, wire-like strip of iron, and she cut it down into three smaller, more workable pieces.

“There,” she said, handing it to him.  “Do you think you can do that?”

“Er,” he hesitated, looking down at the iron in his hand, “I’m not sure I caught all that.  Could you walk me through the process?”

“Of course,” she chuckled, extending her hammer toward him, an action which almost made him flinch.  “Just had to show off a bit first.  Scare you a bit.  Alright, Master Riffel, set those on my table and let’s start again.”

* * *

 

The sun was already low in the sky when Aziraphale made it back home, the beginnings of close to two hundred little links, more than he would need, tucked safely in a pouch at the bottom of his bag under all his papers.  When he got in, Crowley was lounging in a high-backed chair in the corner of their front room, his feet resting on a three-legged stool, ankles crossed.  His eyes were closed, and for a moment Aziraphale thought he was asleep, that is until he sensed the wheels in the demon’s mind starting to turn, the _alertness_ that spiked at the sound of the front door opening and closing.

“Looks like I got back before you did,” Crowley said, his eyes bolting open in a flash of yellow.

“You did,” said Aziraphale, sitting down across from him on a long wooden bench.

“Where did you go today?”

“To visit a student,” he said with a slight shrug.  _Not exactly a lie_ , he thought to himself.  “More reading lessons for young Miss Rohesia Black.”

“Ah,” said Crowley.  “How is that going?”

“She’s making progress.  More than you did.”  He smirked.

“I’ve no need for that.  Nine out of ten bloody people are illiterate, angel.”

“Yes, but literacy does have its benefits.”

“All that’s written about is your side’s history, and even that’s not entirely accurate,” said Crowley, sitting up and letting his feet fall to the floor.

“No,” said Aziraphale.  “Many kingdoms have started to write their own histories and chronicles.  They’re very interesting.  And laws are being written down as well, and some shop keepers and traders are starting to keep records.  And people write letters.”

“Wealthy people write letters,” Crowley corrected him.

“I see no harm in teaching a young woman to read and write,” said Aziraphale.

“Oh, me either,” said Crowley.  “I’ve just not got any personal interest in it as of yet.  Give it a couple hundred years and I may pick it back up again.”

“That’s fine.”

“Why’s she want to read, if you don’t mind my asking?” Crowley asked, genuinely curious.

“As you know, she’s a widow,” he said.  “She lives alone, and as it were, she’s not allowed to remarry.  She continues to run her late husband’s business, but as she’s a woman, a lot of her clients think they can walk all over her, insist they made a payment when they didn’t, insist she’s cheating them somehow, and they end up cheating _her_ out of a lot of her earnings.  She wants to be able to keep a written record as proof of sales to try to keep that from happening.”

Crowley shook his head, impressed.  “My.  Bloody good reason.  Good for her.  She sounds like a smart girl.”

“Yes, I quite agree,” said Aziraphale.  “She’s a very smart girl.  I’m glad to be able to help her.”

“What’s she do for you in return?” asked Crowley with a playful grin.

“Nothing you need be worried about,” Aziraphale said, returning his smile with a tamer one.

Crowley stood and crossed the room to stand in front of Aziraphale.  “That right?”  He knelt down in front of him and rested his arms on the angel’s knees and his head on his arms, looking up at him.

“You know I have no interest in that,” Aziraphale whispered, taking one of Crowley’s hands gently in his own.

“You mean from me or her?” Crowley teased, inching Aziraphale’s tunic up a bit with his free hand.

Aziraphale’s eyes widened, and he laughed.  “You know what I mean, you cheeky man.  Now, come here.”

* * *

 

The next day, Aziraphale made his way back to Rohesia’s shop, a bit less secretively than the day before.  She met him in the dirt path that led up to the door and greeted him with a strong hug, which he awkwardly reciprocated.

“Morning,” she said brightly.

“You’re in a very good mood today,” he said, smiling down at her.

“I was just commissioned to make a sword for a wealthy lord; of course I’m in a good mood,” she said.

“That’s wonderful, Ro,” he replied.  “Lessons first, or metalwork?”

“Today’s the easy part for you, so I was thinking we could go out back and sit at the table and you can work on connecting the links while I read.”

“That works for me, love,” he said with a smile, and he followed her out back where she already had the table set up with the tools he would need and the little book she used to practice her letters in.

“So what you’re going to do is this,” she said, sitting down and picking up the pliers and one of the unshaped links.  “You’ll need to get your first piece, and carefully work it into an oval-like shape like this.  Then get another piece and put it through the hole, and work it into another oval.”

“Sounds easy enough,” he said, taking the pliers from her.

She let out a single, small laugh.  “Alright.”

He opened his bag and passed her the papers to read aloud as he worked, then retrieved the little bag of links he had made the day before.

“What are we reading today?” she asked, looking down at the papers then back up to him.

He nodded to the papers in her hand as if to tell her, “You can read it yourself.  It’s alright.  I know you can do it.”

“ _Judith_ ,” she said slowly.  “What is it?”

“Poetry,” he said, and he started to make his first circle, turning the narrow pliers slowly.  “You can begin whenever you’re ready.”

“Alright,” she said, and she started to read: “‘She dub-ted not—’”

“ _Doubted_ ,” he gently corrected.  “That’s alright.  That’s a hard one.  Silent B.  Keep going.”

She licked her lips and leaned forward, closer to the page.  “‘She _doubted_ n-not his…gifts in this wide ee…ah… _earth_.  Then she reedily—no— _readily_ found there…pro…’”  She set the page down and sighed.  “I don’t know that word, Riffel,” she said.

“Protection,” he said, and he smiled at her.

He was already on his fifth link, she noticed.  Either she was reading very slowly, or he was working a lot faster than he should have been able to as a beginner.  Hell, he was working faster than she did, and she had been making chains like that for almost ten years now.

“Thanks,” she said, returning his smile.  “‘Protection…from the _fay-mouse_ Lord.”

He smiled, unnoticed by her, but did not correct her mispronunciation, and once she was immersed in her reading once more, he lifted another link and willed it into the perfect shape, and connected it to the fast-coming chain in his hands.  Then another, and another, until she looked up.

“Riffel,” she said.

“Yes, love?” he said, lowering his hands to give her his full attention.

“I think it might help,” she said, “if, you know, if I know what this story is about.  I mean, all I see on this page right now is words.  If I knew the meaning behind all the words as a whole, I might know better what I’m looking at.”

“Hm,” he intoned.  He set the chain and pliers down and folded his hands in front of him in thought, his eyes wandering up to the sky.  “Well, the story you’re reading now is about a very brave, godly Christian woman who wants to protect her people, and herself.”

“How does she do that?” she asked.

“Well,” he said hesitantly, “she killed a man, a very bad man.”

“I thought you said she was godly,” said Rohesia, looking down at the cloth that covered the table and picking at a worn spot.

“She was,” he said.  “God forgave her.  She only acted according to the Plan, and like I said, he was not a good man.”

“Ha,” she laughed flatly, forcing a smile and looking as though she were on the verge of tears.  “Right.  Well, let’s get on with it.  Get your necklace for your fair gentleman done.”

“You don’t have to read the whole thing,” he told her.  “Not if you don’t want to.  I can give you something else.”

“I’ll read until you’re done,” she said.  “I don’t mind.”

“If you’re sure.”

She smiled in a way she probably intended to come off as reassuring.  “I am.”

As she read, Aziraphale worked on the chain, adding link after link quicker than he knew he should have, and she read.  Every now and then, he would have to give her a word or explain the meaning of a passage, but otherwise it was peaceful, quiet work.  The day wore on, and from the front of the house, at the end of the dirt path and across the road, they could just barely hear the noise of people going home from the marketplace, the sounds of horses’ hooves on the hard dirt road, and if they listened close enough, the sound of a bird in one of the trees near the back fence getting ready to go to roost.

“I’ve finished the chain,” he said, cutting her off just before she got to the parts he knew might upset her, and he held it up.  Concerned it might be too perfect, he quickly dropped it back on the table so that she wouldn’t notice him miracling a couple of the links into looking a little crooked.  “Oh, clumsy me,” he said, picking it back up, now with a flaw or two he’d obviously have to fix again before giving it to Crowley.

“Can I see?” she asked, and he handed it to her.  “Wow,” she said, impressed as she looked it over.  “You did very well, Riffel.  This is almost perfect.  This is much better than my first chain.  Alfr—my late husband—he could tell you if he was here.”

“Thank you,” he said, taking it back when she was done looking at it and putting it in the small leather bag he had stored the pieces in.  “I was thinking of giving it to him tonight.  Our anniversary isn’t for another few days, but I’m just so excited to see his face when I give it to him.”

“Oh, it was for your anniversary?” she asked, beaming.  “That’s wonderful, Riffel.  How long has it been?”

“Oh,” he said, trying to think of a number that wasn’t too large, “quite a few years.”

In truth, it had been five thousand years since they had first met, and nearly a thousand since they agreed to live alongside each other.  Of course, he couldn’t tell her that, especially when most Anglo Saxons hardly ever made it to their thirties.

“Oh, come on,” she prodded.  “How many?”

“Fine,” he said.  “Sixteen.”

“Sixteen?” she said, her eyebrows raised in astonishment.

“Yes,” he said.  “Sixteen years together.”

 _Sixteen years together…in the Danelaw,_ he thought.  _Still not technically lying._

“Well happy anniversary to you,” she said.  Then, she added, a bit tentatively, “And, I mean, this doesn’t mean anything or make any difference, and please don’t take this the wrong way, but…”

His brow furrowed.  “Yes?”

“How is it you’re married?” she asked.  “I don’t think you ever said.  Certainly, the church doesn’t recognize the union of two men.”

“Oh,” he said.  “No, they don’t.  But by definition, we are married.  We exchanged rings, and he agreed to be married to me.  That’s all it takes really, isn’t it?  How were you and…your late husband married?”

“He asked one day as I was helping him make nails.  We went to the churchyard that same afternoon, so it would be more holy or what have you, and we agreed to be husband and wife,” she said.  “And then we made love in the cemetery.”  She laughed, her face reddening.  “We were chased away by a nun.”

He laughed with her, glad to see her in such a good mood again.  “You consummated your marriage in a church cemetery?”

“It wasn’t like we planned that!” she said defensively, laughing even harder.

He shook his head, amused.  “I never would have guessed.”

She nodded, looking down at the table again, and she gathered up the dozen or so pieces of parchment which made up the poem and handed them back to him.  “Thank you, Riffel.  For the story, for teaching me to read it, for spending the afternoon with me.  For everything.”

“Oh, it’s no problem, Ro,” he said.  “Thank you for helping me with the necklace.”

“See you tomorrow afternoon then.”

“Of course.”

* * *

 

That evening, Aziraphale returned home before Crowley, and after placing the little leather pouch with the chain on Crowley’s stool, he retrieved the manuscript from his bag to read—or pretend to read—until Crowley got home.  He didn’t have to wait long, because just as soon as he had seated himself on the bench, the front door swung open and the demon stepped in.

“Angel, I’m home,” he said, and he came in and plopped down into his chair across from Aziraphale.  He was just about to put his feet on the stool, but he stopped himself, having seen the pouch.  “What’s this?” he asked, picking it up.

“Anniversary gift,” Aziraphale said.

“That’s almost a week away,” said Crowley, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth as he untied the pouch’s string.

“I know,” said Aziraphale.  “I just wanted you to have it now.  I couldn’t wait.”

“Alright,” Crowley chuckled, and he reached into the pouch and withdrew the chain.  “Oh, wow,” he said, his voice quiet.  He looked at it carefully.  It was perfectly made, each link identical, the same size and shape.  “Beautiful craftsmanship.  Just beautiful,” he murmured.  “Must have cost a fortune.  Angel, you didn’t have to.”

“I made it,” said Aziraphale.

“What, like…like I make things?” Crowley said with a smirk.

“No, I mean, actually physically I made it.  I’ve been working with a blacksmith, remember?”

Crowley’s jaw fell slack, and he quickly looked at the chain in his hands again, then at Aziraphale.  “You…you _made_ this, like you mean that you actually _made_ it.”

“Yes.”

“You…oh my.”

A small, genuine, unstoppable sort of smile spread across his face, and he looked as though he were about to cry.

“I’ve been teaching her how to read, and, well, she taught me how to make that.”

“Thank you,” said Crowley softly.  “I love it. I’m going to wear it forever.”

“I’m glad you like it.”

“No, I mean that,” he said.  “I will literally wear it forever.  Thank you so much, angel.  This means a lot.  No one’s ever done something like this for me before.”

“The tortoise brooches,” Aziraphale started to say.

“He gave me those.  He didn’t make them,” said Crowley.  “I have no idea where or-or how he got them.  This means so much more because you actually made it.  You took the time to…to _create_ something, and the human way, too.  That couldn’t have been easy.”

“It wasn’t.  But, I must admit,” Aziraphale said, looking a tad guilty, “I did cheat a bit, but only during the assembly process.  Just to, you know, to speed things up a bit.  I was impatient.”

“Still!  It’s amazing, angel.  And I mean…that almost makes it better,” Crowley chuckled.  “Really, thank you, Aziraphale.  I love it.”  He got up to move to the bench to hug him, the chain still in his hand.  “I love you,” he whispered.

“I love you, too.”  Aziraphale pecked him on the cheek.  “Do you want me to put it on you?”

“I can,” Crowley said before realizing Aziraphale was offering a romantic gesture.  “Oh!  But, er, if you want to, yes.  Please.”

“Alright,” Aziraphale said, taking the chain from him.

Crowley turned and moved his hair out of the way, letting the angel reach around him to lay the chain over his chest and clasp it behind his neck.  He could feel Aziraphale’s breath on his neck, and his own caught in his throat.

“There,” Aziraphale whispered, moving back again.

Crowley let out a shuddering breath and cleared his throat.  “Aziraphale?”

“Yes, dear?”

“Come here,” he said, and swung around to face Aziraphale once more, wrapped his arms around his neck, and kissed him.

**Author's Note:**

> A NOTE ON MY OC: Rohesia the blacksmith is a character from a story I wrote when I was in high school. In that story, she was a woman who had killed her husband when he tried to rape her, and though she only did it in self-defense, she was sentenced to death. While awaiting her execution, though, a mysterious "Man in White" pleaded for her life, and in exchange for a miracle, she was freed. Obviously this "Man in White" wasn't Aziraphale. The "Man in White" was a sorcerer in my other story. But as I needed a blacksmith for this story, I thought I'd recycle one of my favorite OCs, and swap the sorcerer for an angel.


End file.
